Mets pitcher Chris Young sneaks up on hitters, despite his lack of velocity

Noah K. Murray/The Star-LedgerChris Young, a 6-foot-10 former All-Star who has battled injuries the last few years, is vying for a spot in the Mets' starting rotation.

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. — The magic trick begins when Mets pitcher Chris Young raises his left leg and tucks his hands behind his knee. It ends when he lunges his 6-10 frame toward home plate and releases a fastball from his right hand.

The radar gun provides one reaction: Middling velocity, something around 87 mph. Opposing hitters have another: They call it the “Invisiball.”

Vying for a spot in the Mets’ starting rotation, Young’s height is no secret: In the Digital Domain Park clubhouse last week, manager Terry Collins, a generous listing at 5-9, pulled a pair of Young’s pants from his locker. They stretched from the floor to Collins’ neck.

Yet his oversized frame provides cover on the mound. It gave Young confidence last fall, when he operated with an 85-mph fastball during three starts with San Diego as he returned from two years lost to a shoulder injury. His mechanics reassured him.

“It’s a challenge,” Young said. “At times, it’s a blessing, too, if everything’s in sync.”

The visual illusion is two-fold: Young’s extended stride and long arms allow him to release the baseball closer to the plate and reduce the distance between batter and mound. That makes an 87 mph fastball look like something closer to 93 mph. “It almost feels like he’s releasing it five feet in front of you,” third baseman David Wright said.

Second, Young’s over-the-top release alters a batter’s eye level. His fastball appears fat as it approaches the plate. But the ball doesn’t drop into the zone. It rides high, above a batter’s hands, spoiling his swing. “When you swing,” Reyes said, “pop-up to the infield.”

For taller pitchers, the benefit comes with some cost. Their mechanics can be difficult to repeat, Mets pitching coach Dan Warthen explained. In 2010, for example, Warthen lowered 6-7 starter Mike Pelfrey’s hands before his windup to smooth his delivery.

In the summer of 1998, Princeton baseball coach Scott Bradley traveled to a Texas tournament to recruit Young. Bradley had never seen Young pitch. He only knew he was tall. That day, he parked his car and gazed across the grass.

“I see this right-hander on one field, with a pretty nice, smooth delivery, repeating his delivery,” Bradley said. “I said, ‘Well, that’s probably not him.’

“I look around. And the closer I get, it looked like the whole dynamic of the field changed. It was like the field was almost too small.”

The pitcher was Young.

Over the years, Young, 31, assembled a checklist of mechanical anxieties. He worries about his back leg collapsing, his body moving faster than his arm, his glove rising too high during his delivery. In between starts, he prefers to throw off a mound to keep his mechanics uniform. A simple delivery masks the illusion.

Physics create the first deception. Glenn Fleisig, the research director at the American Sports Medicine Institute in Birmingham, Ala., noted that the average elite pitcher’s stride is 82 percent of his height. Therein lies Young’s advantage.

Consider this. Both Chris Young and his new teammate, Dillon Gee, throw fastballs with velocity in the upper 80s. But Young lands seven inches closer to the hitter than Gee. With shorter distance to the plate, Fleisig said, “there is a decreased time for the batter to react.”

Young’s approach creates the second deception. He modeled his delivery after burly right-handers like Roger Clemens and Curt Schilling. Both stretched the strike zone with high, four-seam fastballs. Young tries the same tack. Batters often cannot resist.

“His fastball up, for some reason, just looks like it’s a good pitch to hit,” said Wright, who is 1-for-9 lifetime against Young. “And then when you start swinging at it, it just kind of stays up there.”

The result is an extreme propensity for flyballs. In 2006-07, his last full seasons, Young led the majors in flies. In those two seasons, he allowed one home run per nine innings. In 2007, he also compiled the lowest homer-to-flyball ratio in baseball.

To succeed, of course, Young must remain on the field. His shoulder sidelined him the past two seasons. He keeps his optimism cautious. He commits his days to sharpening his delivery, refining the Invisiball.

“I’m still learning,” Young said. “I think that I’m getting to know my body better and better, and my mechanics. It’s just a gradual process that has come with time, and I’m still trying to evolve.”